He Got Into Wrestling by Accident
Growing up, Flair never hid his passion for wrestling. In high school, Flair was a gifted athlete in track and football and won the state championship in amateur wrestling. But his father wanted his son to get into the family business. At first, Flair humored him and studied medicine at the University of Minnesota.
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Only when he happened to find a gateway into the wrestling business by accident did he drop his studies. As a student, he started working as a bouncer and met Olympic weightlifter Ken Patera. Patera saw something special in the young bouncer and introduced him to former wrestler Verne Gagne, who was also impressed by him. In 1971, Gagne invited Flair to attend his notoriously brutal wrestling camp. The rest, my friends, is history.